Then they came for the Jews, and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a Jew.

Then they came for the trade unionists, and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a trade unionist.

Then they came for the Catholics,and I didn’t speak up because I was a Protestant.

Then they came for me,and by that time no one was left to speak up.”

Nearly eight decades since the start of World War II, Pastor Martin Niemöller’s haunting message, sadly, remains more relevant than ever. Faced with the world’s greatest refugee crisis since the Holocaust, President Trump and his administration have issued an Executive Order on immigration that willfully turns America’s back on the world’s neediest. As a community, it’s incumbent upon us to show our voice and commitment to not only “Welcome the Stranger” but also to forcefully declare “Never Again.”

This will be a time for people of all faiths and backgrounds to come together peacefully to honor our history and, in that spirit, protest the cruelty of a policy that threatens to cause significant global suffering. We are better than this and must hold our elected officials and government accountable by giving voice to the voiceless.

This event is also hosted by the American Association of Jewish Holocaust Survivors & Descendants of Greater Boston; Boston City Councilor Josh Zakim; and the Islamic Society of Boston Cultural Center (ISBCC).